I'm almost daily trying to convince fellow progressives to explore the option of voting third party, and they're wondering why some of us are practically handing the keys to the H-bomb button to Sarah Palin.

Today's lesson is brought to us by the letter T. As in "Tea Parties." Notice the deliberation with which I painfully point out the plurality here*. Not, "Tea PartY", but the plural version. Because it's not one single movement, or ideology, or people group. Just as Evangelicals shouldn't be known simply as followers of James Dobson, Jim Wallis, or (Lord, please no!) Franklin Graham, nor does every Tea Partier belong to the racist and arrogant class of the Mark Williamses or the arrogant and racist class of the Andrew Breitbarts or the pro-bullying, anti-gay, blame-deflecting class of Rich Swier. None of which, ironically, have any class. Or morals.

These butt-hats don't represent all of the Tea Party. Just parts of it (apparently, the parts that call itself Tea Party Nation and the Tea Party Express). Tea Partiers don't agree on racism, bullying, or theocracy, or even owning guns. They ostensibly say that taxes are too high and that government spending is out-of-control. Among this crowd are some black and Latino conservatives.

We may not agree with them much of what they espouse - and even if I did, I would completely distance myself from the likes of Bachmann, Breitbart, Palin, and Swier, that guy with the sign of President Obama in an "African witchdoctor" get-up, or that California douchebag who distributed emails of watermelon outside the White House lawn - but we can find points of interest and agreement with most of those on "the other side".

Conservatives, moderates, libertarians, progressives, liberals, anarchists, and lefties can agree on any number of issues - as long as we're not all tied down to the definitions given us by the lazy media. The leadership of the Southern Baptist Convention and I may disagree about any number of matters, but when it comes to giving migrants a fair chance in this country, we're on the same page. Many L&O types are as well, including this lovely conservative Republican mayor of a small town in Georgia, Paul Bridges.

Many TP'ers are against wars, as are many of the conservative and liberal libertarians and anarchists. That is an area that progressives (and like-minded liberals and moderates, etc.) can join together and will NEED to join together in order to challenge the Military-Industrial Complex that has taken control of both parties in the United States.

My friends, I ask only of you what Crosby, Stills, Nash and sometimes Young asked: